Source: European Parliament
The Commission has currently two ongoing grant contracts with the European Feminist Initiative.
The Commission is currently verifying all the elements reported in the quoted article and provided by NGO Monitor. After a complete review of these allegations, the Commission will act in line with contractual provisions and the EU Financial Regulation[1].
The Commission is bound to ensure that no persons or entities receive EU funding if they are involved in criminal or unethical practices, terrorist financing and terrorist offences.
EU restrictive measures are applicable to any of the Commission grant beneficiaries all over the world. The EU is also strictly opposed to incitement of violence and hatred.
Specific clauses have been introduced in all grant contracts with beneficiaries managing EU funds in the occupied Palestinian territories and in Israel.
Pursuant to these clauses, these grant beneficiaries shall not engage in activities as defined by the Council Framework Decision 2008/913/JHA on combating certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia by means of criminal law[2], which include incitement to violence or hatred.
This prohibition is without prejudice to the respect of fundamental rights as enshrined in Article 6 of the Treaty on EU[3] (TEU) including the right of freedom of expression and information and the right of freedom of assembly and association as guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms[4].
Moreover, a new provision has been inserted into the EU Financial Regulation which provides that grant beneficiaries and contractors shall be excluded from future EU funding in case of ‘incitement to discrimination, hatred and violence against a group of persons or a member of a group, or similar activities that are contrary to the values on which the Union is founded enshrined in Article 2 TEU, where such misconduct has an impact on the person or entity’s integrity which negatively affects or concretely risks affecting the performance of the legal commitment’[5].
- [1] Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 September 2024 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union (recast), OJ L, 2024/2509, 26.9.2024.
- [2] OJ L 328, 6.12.2008, p. 55-58.
- [3] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:12016M/TXT
- [4] https://www.echr.coe.int/documents/d/echr/Convention_ENG
- [5] Article 138(1)(c)(vi) of Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509.